THREE KISSES OF FAREWELL. THREE, only three, my darling, Separate, solemn, slow; Not like the swift and joyous ones When we kissed because we loved each other, And lavished our kisses as the summer Lavishes heat; But as they kiss whose hearts are wrung, And nothing is left to give, except First of the three, my darling, We have hurt each other often, When we pine because we miss each other, How the written words are so much colder I kiss thee, dear, for all such pain The second kiss, my darling, We have blessed each other always, We always will. We shall reach until we feel each other, Beyond all time and space; We shall listen till we hear each other The earth is full of messengers, Which love sends to and fro; I kiss thee, darling, for all joy The last kiss, oh! my darling- Through my tears, as I remember We may die and never see each other, Any sign that our hearts are faithful Token of what they will not see Who see our parting breath. This one last kiss, my darling, seals The seal of death! THE ARGOSY. DECEMBER 1, 1874. IN THE DEAD OF NIGHT. CHAPTER XXX V I. WHAT TO DO NEXT. OT to everyone among the children of men is given the power, NOT the faculty, to act as comforter to others. To listen to another's sorrow, to be told the history of another's trouble, is one thing: to be able to give back comfort is another. That delicate intuitive sympathy with another's woe, which draws away the sting even in the telling of it; which makes that woe its own property, as it were; which sheds balm round the sufferer in every word, and look, and touch: this is surely as much a special gift as the gift of song, or the poet's fine phrenzy, and without it the world would be a much poorer place than it is. This rare gift of sympathy was possessed by Edith Dering in a preeminent degree. She was at once emotional and sympathetic. To Lionel in his dire trouble she was a comforter in the truest sense of the word. It was she who preserved his mental balance-the equipoise of his mind. But for her sweet offices he would have become a monomaniac or a misanthrope of the bitterest kind. Naturally she had him with her as much as possible, but still his home was of necessity at Park Newton. To the world he was simply Richard Dering, the unmarried nephew of General St. George. It would not do for him to be seen going to Fern Cottage sufficiently often to excite either scandal or suspicion. He could only visit there as the intimate friend of Mrs. Garside and her niece. Sometimes he took his uncle with him, sometimes Tom, in order to divert suspicion. For him to enter the garden-gate of Fern Cottage was to cross the threshold of his earthly paradise. Edith and he had been married in the depth of a great trouble-troubles and danger had beset the path of their wedded life ever since. Owing, perhaps, to that very cause, week by week, and VOL. XVIII. D D month by month, their love seemed only to grow in depth and intensity. As yet it had lost nothing of its pristine charm and freshness. The gold-dust of romance lingered about it still. They were man and wife; they had been man and wife for months; but to the world at large they seemed nothing more than ordinary friends. But all Edith's care and watchful love could not lift her husband, except by fits and starts, out of those moods of gloom and depression which seemed to be settling more closely down upon him day by day. As link after link was added to the chain of evidence, each one leading to incriminate his cousin still more deeply, his moods seemed to grow darker and more difficult of removal. With his cousin, Lionel associated no more than was absolutely necessary. They rarely met each other till dinner-time, and then they met with nothing more than a simple "How do you do?" and in conversation they never got beyond some half-dozen of the barest common-places. Lionel always left the table as soon as the cloth was removed. On Kester's side there was no love lost. That dark, stern-faced cousin was a perpetual menace to him, and he hated him accordingly. He hated him for his likeness to his dead and gone brother. He hated him because of the look in his eyes-so coldly scrutinizing, so searching, so immovable. He hated him because it was a look that he could in nowise give back. Try as he might, he could not face Lionel's steady gaze. For some two or three weeks after his return from Bath with Janvard's written confession, Lionel was perfectly quiescent. He took no further action whatever. He was, indeed, debating in his own mind what further action it behoved him to take. There was no need to seek for any further evidence, if indeed any more would have been forthcoming. All that he wanted he had now got; it was simply a question as to what use he should make of it. Day and night that was the question which presented itself before his mind what use should he make of the knowledge in his possession? His mind was divided this way and that; day passed after day, and still he could by no means decide as to the course which it would be best for him to adopt. Of all this he said not a word to Edith: he could not have borne. to discuss the question even with her; but it is possible that she surmised something of it. She knew that she had only to wait, and everything would be told her. Perhaps to Bristow, who knew all the details of the case as well as he did, he might have said something as to the difficulty by which he was beset; but as it happened, Tom was not at home just then. Much of his time was spent by Lionel in long solitary walks far and wide through the country. He could think better when he was walking than when sitting quietly at home, he used to say; and, indeed, the country folk who encountered him often turned to look at him, as he stalked along, with his eyes set straight before him, gazing |